At a cafe a long way from here (and whose name I am not at liberty to divulge), Bill Bernbach, Marshall McLuhan, and Steve Jobs met for a cup of chamomile and a slice of Heavenly Hash cake. While it’s impossible to vouch for the complete veracity of this conversation, we can be reasonably sure that the ideas expressed below are accurate in what they uphold of the participants’ respective philosophies.

]]>https://www.fastcompany.com/1681511/bill-bernbach-steve-jobs-and-marshall-mcluhan-walk-into-a-cafe-and-talk-about-advertising?partner=rss&utm_source=rss&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=rss+fastcompany&utm_content=rss
https://www.fastcompany.com/1681511/bill-bernbach-steve-jobs-and-marshall-mcluhan-walk-into-a-cafe-and-talk-about-advertisingFri, 16 Oct 2015 17:38:29 GMTWith his latest creation lurching toward screens, Robert Kirkman takes us back to a day at a comics convention that set him on the path to The Walking Dead.

The monster success of The Walking Dead feels so inevitable now. The show, which has broken one ratings and social media record (the season five premiere earned 17 million total viewers and 1,320,056 tweets) after another, is the cultural phenomenon we need and deserve as a society reckoning with our own suddenly looming mortality. It may not be walkers on the horizon, but we live with the collective feeling that something is going to overrun our idyllic farm sooner rather than later.

It’s hard to remember now, but the success of the first season of True Detective wasn’t telegraphed in advance. The cast of HBO’s southern gothic crime procedural was certainly intriguing, but so was the cast of HBO’s The Brink and, well, the less said about HBO’s The Brink the better. One of the many surprise pleasures of True Detective was the wealth of conversation-halting nihilist philosophy Matthew McConaughey’s Rust Cohle liked to chew on. His highly meme-able musings ranged from deep, dark and worrisome to hilariously overwritten nuggets of ponderous pap. Few fans of the first season imagined that the latter brand of dialogue would be one of the only elements of consistency in the terminally tumultuous season two.

]]>https://www.fastcompany.com/3049214/watch-a-supercut-of-every-deep-philosophical-musing-from-true-detective-season-2-2?partner=rss&utm_source=rss&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=rss+fastcompany&utm_content=rss
https://www.fastcompany.com/3049214/watch-a-supercut-of-every-deep-philosophical-musing-from-true-detective-season-2-2Thu, 30 Jul 2015 13:57:00 GMTEven this you get to experience: a video tale of conquering the “shit in your head,” from a TV pioneer.

When Norman Lear appeared on The Daily Show at the end of last year, Jon Stewart spoke for just about all of the show’s more grizzled viewers when he greeted the famed TV producer with the words: “I want to thank you for raising me.”

Metaphors have long permeated creative expression from cave paintings to commercials. And there’s a good reason that Geico is “So easy, a cavemen can do it,” Prudential gives you a “Piece of the Rock,” and Allstate’s “Good Hands” people help rid you of that bastard “Mayhem.” Science is proving that metaphors can have a huge impact on our decisions, even more than facts.

]]>https://www.fastcompany.com/3048817/why-metaphors-beat-the-snot-out-of-facts-when-it-comes-to-motivating-action?partner=rss&utm_source=rss&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=rss+fastcompany&utm_content=rss
https://www.fastcompany.com/3048817/why-metaphors-beat-the-snot-out-of-facts-when-it-comes-to-motivating-actionWed, 29 Jul 2015 08:16:00 GMTIf you can’t laugh at a good dish soap brainstorm, what can you laugh at?

Believe it or not, I look back fondly on the hour we spent in our studio last year, brainstorming for a visual glossary for gout. As well as being a painful and much misunderstood medical condition, gout is surprisingly rich creative territory, it turns out.

“I’m working at a reasonable pace where I can focus, intently and undisturbed, for long periods of time on the important parts of my work, while planning for the future with a great sense of optimism, confident I can contribute to solving our society’s biggest problems,” said nobody this year. Overworked, overstimulated, distracted, FOMO-plagued, and device-obsessed is our default state–a function of the rate of change wrought by digital technology. But to see our current state as merely “moving faster” may be missing a larger shift.

]]>https://www.fastcompany.com/1682643/no-future-present-shock-and-why-our-now-fixation-has-changed-everything-from-advertising-to?partner=rss&utm_source=rss&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=rss+fastcompany&utm_content=rss
https://www.fastcompany.com/1682643/no-future-present-shock-and-why-our-now-fixation-has-changed-everything-from-advertising-toWed, 08 Jul 2015 08:49:51 GMTActivision Publishing CEO Eric Hirshberg recently gave the commencement address to graduates of UCLA School of Art and Architecture. It has an important message about creativity in business, and the role of the “creative,” so we’ve reprinted it here.

Eric Hirshberg came to his role as CEO of Activision Publishing via an unusual route–he was previously the CEO and chief creative officer of an ad agency, Deutsch. But, as Hirshberg notes in his commencement address to UCLA School of the Arts and Architecture grads, his provenance isn’t just unique for a game company leader. It’s unusual–in fact, vanishingly rare–for a “creative” to rise to the ranks of CEO in any company.

]]>https://www.fastcompany.com/3047476/the-university-of-my-eyeballs-or-why-creatives-should-be-leading-corporations?partner=rss&utm_source=rss&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=rss+fastcompany&utm_content=rss
https://www.fastcompany.com/3047476/the-university-of-my-eyeballs-or-why-creatives-should-be-leading-corporationsTue, 16 Jun 2015 12:12:00 GMTThe drive to gather more data isn’t going to subside, but numbers shouldn’t be a replacement for vision. Sudhir Venkatesh discusses how companies can use data to foster, rather than quash, creativity.

If you are wondering how the Big Data revolution is changing business, listen to the findings of a recent Forrester Research report:

]]>https://www.fastcompany.com/3047357/thinking-small-3-ways-to-remain-creative-in-a-world-of-big-data?partner=rss&utm_source=rss&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=rss+fastcompany&utm_content=rss
https://www.fastcompany.com/3047357/thinking-small-3-ways-to-remain-creative-in-a-world-of-big-dataTue, 16 Jun 2015 06:00:00 GMTSudhir Venkatesh asks, “Are you talking a good game on disruption, or are you actively embracing the power of conflict in the creative process?

The average CEO spends 25% of his time coping with conflicts. It’s worth asking how much of that conflict has truly been used for useful purposes, like fostering creativity?

Philosophers are as important to brands and businesses as strategists or IT experts. That’s the view of writer and philosopher Alain De Botton, who along with his colleagues at the philosophy center he founded, The School of Life, is offering advice to businesses on how to innovate and make customers and employees happier by embracing philosophical truths.

]]>https://www.fastcompany.com/3047226/a-philosopher-takes-on-marketing-4-lessons-for-brands-from-alain-de-botton?partner=rss&utm_source=rss&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=rss+fastcompany&utm_content=rss
https://www.fastcompany.com/3047226/a-philosopher-takes-on-marketing-4-lessons-for-brands-from-alain-de-bottonMon, 15 Jun 2015 06:00:00 GMTDirector Bao Nguyen talks about distilling 40 years of SNL into a feature doc, the keys to the show’s longevity and his favorite sketch.

The 40th season of Saturday Night Live ended this past May, but over the past nine months fans have been delivered a highly-rated three-and-a-half-hour anniversary special on prime time television, an expanded edition of Tom Shales and James Andrew Miller’s exhaustive oral history of the show, and plenty of debate-worthy pieces about its best cast members, most controversial sketches, most frequent FCC complaints, and more. To end this victory lap, this Friday will see the theatrical release of the documentary Live From New York!, which opened the Tribeca Film Festival this past April.

]]>https://www.fastcompany.com/3046884/live-from-new-york-breaking-down-the-enduring-impact-of-snl?partner=rss&utm_source=rss&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=rss+fastcompany&utm_content=rss
https://www.fastcompany.com/3046884/live-from-new-york-breaking-down-the-enduring-impact-of-snlFri, 12 Jun 2015 06:00:00 GMTThe director–and writer–of Spy talks to us about the challenges of making a comedy that’s still death-defying, and shooting his favorite scene ever.

]]>https://www.fastcompany.com/3047039/how-paul-feig-busted-genres-and-activated-melissa-mccarthy-in-spy?partner=rss&utm_source=rss&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=rss+fastcompany&utm_content=rss
https://www.fastcompany.com/3047039/how-paul-feig-busted-genres-and-activated-melissa-mccarthy-in-spyFri, 05 Jun 2015 06:00:00 GMTNeil deGrasse Tyson tells us a story about a teenage trip to study stone monuments and how that led to the discovery of Manhattanhenge.

Burger Week aside, there are few more exciting prospects for urban Instagrammers than Manhattanhenge.

]]>https://www.fastcompany.com/3046868/how-neil-degrasse-tyson-discovered-manhattanhenge?partner=rss&utm_source=rss&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=rss+fastcompany&utm_content=rss
https://www.fastcompany.com/3046868/how-neil-degrasse-tyson-discovered-manhattanhengeFri, 29 May 2015 12:48:00 GMTThe podcast pioneer talks about the difference between Maron and Maron, and comedy in a social world. “The truth of the matter is you can say whatever (word) you want. You just might find yourself alienated and only allowed to hang out with people that say that word. So I hope you want those people as your friends.”

Marc Maron isn’t sneaking up on anyone anymore. Six years after he ducked into the Air America studios to record his first set of WTF podcasts after getting fired from the radio network, he’s one of the big names in the podcasting world. And the success in podcasting has led to the most prolific time of Maron’s 26-year career, in which he’s written two books, brought his stand-up act to larger venues, and created a comedy series appropriately entitled Maron. With the third season of the show underway, Maron talks to us about the line between life and TV (and getting closure on the former via the latter), the post-Serial world of podcasting, and the realities of comedy in a Twitter universe.

]]>https://www.fastcompany.com/3046546/marc-maron-on-closure-via-sitcom-the-rise-of-the-podcast-and-being-a-comedian-on-twitter?partner=rss&utm_source=rss&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=rss+fastcompany&utm_content=rss
https://www.fastcompany.com/3046546/marc-maron-on-closure-via-sitcom-the-rise-of-the-podcast-and-being-a-comedian-on-twitterWed, 27 May 2015 06:00:00 GMTStrategist Ana Andjelic argues that brands should step back from questions of whether their communications are creative enough, and offers five paths to the real question–“question zero.”

]]>https://www.fastcompany.com/3045707/are-you-solving-the-right-business-problem-here-are-5-ways-to-get-to-your-question-zero?partner=rss&utm_source=rss&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=rss+fastcompany&utm_content=rss
https://www.fastcompany.com/3045707/are-you-solving-the-right-business-problem-here-are-5-ways-to-get-to-your-question-zeroWed, 20 May 2015 06:00:00 GMTOut of 32 leaders from film and TV, from gangsters to starship captains, one boss was chosen. And she’s a doozy.

The voters have spoken and they’ve chosen M, James Bond’s boss–as played by Judi Dench–as the best fictional leader ever.

]]>https://www.fastcompany.com/3046424/the-boss-bracket-vote-for-the-greatest-movie-tv-leader-semi-finals?partner=rss&utm_source=rss&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=rss+fastcompany&utm_content=rss
https://www.fastcompany.com/3046424/the-boss-bracket-vote-for-the-greatest-movie-tv-leader-semi-finalsTue, 19 May 2015 06:00:00 GMTArt from Paola Pivel, Yuji Agematsu, and Jonathan Horowitz figured among the highlights from this year’s Frieze New York.

When the Frieze art fair rolled into New York’s Randall’s Island May 14-16, it brought with it works by more than 1,000 artists from 198 commercial dealers from around the world (and three nonprofit galleries), occupying three football fields’ worth of gallery space.

]]>https://www.fastcompany.com/3046405/8-showstoppers-from-the-frieze-art-fair?partner=rss&utm_source=rss&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=rss+fastcompany&utm_content=rss
https://www.fastcompany.com/3046405/8-showstoppers-from-the-frieze-art-fairMon, 18 May 2015 12:44:00 GMTTo mark our New Rules of Work week: a chance for you to vote for the fictional boss you think is the most inspirational, effective leader in the universe.